Only a vegetable would say jihad does not mean violence when applied to the struggle between Dar al Islam and Dar al Harb.

In Islam, jihad is sacred. In it, Islam is a political structure that has combined rule and religion.

We in the west don't get that.

The violence is sacred and political at the same time. That is why islam is winning this war of religion. The west is fighting and denying at every turn that this is a war of religions. We might wish it to be that way, but the enemy has never claimed it was anything else!